Te Araroa (The Long Pathway) is a 1800 mile hiking trail across New Zealand. From the Cape Reinga at the top of the North Island to Bluff at the botom of the South Island. It crosses varied terrain from wind swept sandy beaches to think jungly forests, crossing huges rivers and climbing high mountain passes. For more information on the trail, vist the Te Araroa Trust.

With a Canon 5D and iPad we blogged our way across New Zealand. Notching up over 800 posts, documenting in juicy detail our daily discoveries, disasters and victories! Start from the top, to follow the full blood-sweat-and-tears adventure. Alternatively, check out a region on the map – jump to the best bit – Mt Cook! Or simply skip to the finish-line champagne :)

If you just want to see the photos check out our Flickr set, or if you just want to see the video check out our Vimeo album.

I‘ve just finished this short highlights video of the Te Araroa. It’s roughly in chronological order from the Top of the North Island to the bottom of the south, unfortunately I don’t have any footage of us getting to the end due to a memory card malfunction… Song used: Bow Wow by Tommy Bass

Update: There’s now an official printable map set from the Te Araroa Trust, you’re best using these for the most up-to-date and accurate route info.

If you’re planning on doing the Te Araroa trail in New Zealand, or just fancy having a closer look at what me and Nicky are going to be doing for the next 6 months, then here’s all the maps (268.4MB)! I can’t guarantee the route I’ve drawn on is accurate, the route itself is constantly changing, but also expect a fair amount of human error! If you use these maps follow your judgement and common sense, over the orange line. I didn’t get around to making all the map notes I’d of liked too.. but I’ve run out of time now and need to get on with other stuff. My plan is to check for the latest route descriptions and read people’s journals to find out info about the next section as we go and then doodle these notes onto my printed out maps. I’ve left a space on every page to be used for this purpose.

I always enjoy the pre-walk planning and mapping stage, although I’ve never bitten off anything even remotely as complex or long as this before.. Got to say a big thank you to Land Information New Zealand who made all the 1:50,000 scale topographic maps and hats off to you for making them all freely downloadable :) The Te Araroa Trust for building the trail in the first place and providing all the route descriptions on their site. And most importantly to Geoff Chapple who founded the trust 16 years ago and who has been spearheading it’s development ever since.

When you’re following a pre-defined route, there’s always the temptation to work out a few variations that suit you’re own preference of terrain etc. While mapping the trail I managed to rack up more than I was expecting, 57 maps worth in total! I’ve got no idea how many, if any of these we’ll do, those sort of decisions usually make themselves at the time. But if you’re interested, these can be downloaded too (164.9MB).

Word of warning though – I’ve never been to New Zealand, so have absolutely no personal experience whether these are any good or not. I think they are all probably longer and more difficult than the official route.. But they do follow the same numbering as the official route maps (just with a ‘b’ after the number) so you can see where they fit into the trail.

We’d been looking forward to this day for so long it felt bizarre that it’d finally arrived. Suddenly I found myself on a plane after days of rushing around packing boxes, cleaning the house, hectic weddings, and several boozy doo’s kissing friends goodbye… And so, kicked out the house, we set off to become the homeless hobo, foreign immigrant tramps we’d been dreaming about ;) Goodbye hair dryer. Goodbye showers. Goodbye comfy bed. We were off!

24hours of shear teeth pulling hell lay ahead in the form of an airplane torture chair, or so we thought. But you know what? It wasn’t too bad. In fact, the food was amazing! Lamb curry and fry up in proper little plates. Toy story 3 and Predators movies kept us going, as did a 3 hr marathon MahJong session. Air New Zealand gets a thumbs up from me. And it wasn’t too bouncy either considering they were flying us just ahead if a super cyclone about to hit the Phillipines and Hong Kong? Awesome work pilot for getting us there safe and vomit free. Thank you! :D

Oh yeh, the other weird thing. Time travel! We managed to get on on Saturday and land on Monday, get 2 mini days and nights in, but all in 24hrs. So I think basically Sunday didn’t exist…? Whatever, but it makes your body feel a bit weird I can tell you! Doctor Who must have had a strong composure is all I can say :)

So far we’ve slept a lot, drank a lot, and ate fish & chips at the oldest pub in Auckland… And bought an iPad…

Day one in Orc-land.. I don’t remember too much about arriving. Me brain was a mush and it felt like someone had stuck some Rohypnol in that Lamb Curry. And so blurry eyed and greasy haired we stumbled our way through BioSecurity being meticulously checked, not for explosives and red or blue wires, but instead we were frisked and inspected for terrifying things such as soil and ham sandwiches… I have my suspicions I may have hallucinated the whole thing…

And when I’d started to take in the reality that we were suddenly revealed to be on the other side of planet earth, I opened the curtains of the hotel room to be confronted by an Independence Day style space ship casually parked up in the middle of town… No one seemed to be batting an eyelid, and so I returned to my previous theory of sleep deprivation, ignored the impending alien invasion and collapsed into a comfortable coma on the bed.

Note to self: Never fall asleep to a background movie of 28 weeks later, if you’ve gone without sleep for more than a day. It’s a sure fire way of vividly experiencing being eaten alive by your co-workers and friends. You won’t know what the f**** going on when you wake up.

Gasp! Where’s the baked beans ?? … D: (horror!). Actually Ronnie’s breakfast was pretty good, and welcome fuel in the fight against jet lag. But i suspect the sausages may never have uttered an Oink in their past life – slight chance they may have shouted Baaaah …. But definitely contents ‘unconfirmed’…

We didn’t expect to be fighting our way through thick jungle today, only went to find the local DOC (Department of Conservation) office! Word of warning to anyone else using google maps to find it, this is where they’ve put the pin and there’s certainly no office here..

Some words of wisdom spotted outside the vets in Kaitaia. He clearly has to handle something more formidable than your average rabbit. Picturing a caged lion in there getting a root canal or something!

So now we’re finding it quite poinient on our last night before the big day ( being dropped off at the remote tip of a country in the wind and rain! ). So wish us luck… We might need it :)

In a way I guess you could say we’ve run away from the world for a bit. But as the big drop-off day draws closer I think the alternate meaning is resonating more ;)